Language Services

At Ayuda, we work to make sure that everyone can get help when they need it, regardless of the languages that they use to communicate.

We partner with and work for a wide array of clients, non-profit organizations, legal and social professionals, and more. Use one of the links below to learn about our language access services, our partnerships, and our opportunities. If you have any questions, please contact interpreterbank@ayuda.com.

Powered by grants from the DC Bar Foundation and the Montgomery County Executive, Our Community Legal Interpreter Bank ensures that a language barrier never stands in the way when a low-income person needs legal assistance.

Current Providers: We value our partnership with you.

Thank you for your support of the Community Legal Interpreter Bank.

We strive to continue our partnership, offering the following free services to ensure that you are meeting your legal and ethical obligations when it comes to communicating with your clients and potential clients:

Specially-trained, in-person interpreters working in more than 20 languages (including American Sign Language). Our interpreters are trained in the attorney/client privilege, confidentiality, and the unauthorized practice of law.

Telephonic interpretation in more than 200 languages, available at any hour of the day or night, every day of the year. (DC Only)

Interested Providers

If you have never used the services of the Community Legal Interpreter Bank before but would like to, you may be able to join our bank. If you meet certain criteria, and if there is funding available, you will receive services for free. Otherwise, you may be able to access the services of our bank for a fee. Learn more.

Eligibility Criteria

You may apply for free services from the Community Legal Interpreter Bank if your organization fits into either 1 or 2 below.

A non-profit organization located in Washington, DC, that provides direct civil legal services to low-income DC residents or to individuals with a legal matter in DC. “Direct legal services” is defined as:

Appellate advocacy on behalf of DC residents (or on behalf of individuals with legal matters in DC)

Policy advocacy in DC that is associated with the representation of individual clients

A non-profit organization in Montgomery County, MD, that provides direct civil legal services to low-income Montgomery County residents or to individuals with legal matters in Montgomery County.

Nonprofits located outside of DC or Montgomery County that serve clients who reside in DC or Montgomery County, or have legal matters in DC, are also eligible to use the bank for those clients.

Applications

Before completing an application to become part of the Community Legal Interpreter Bank, please contact us to ensure that our funding allows for new applications at this time. You may write to interpreterbank@ayuda,com.

Washington DC
Application and MOU

Montgomery County
Application and MOU

With funding from the DC Office of Victim Services, Ayuda’s Victim Services Interpreter Bank helps to ensure that a language barrier never stands in the way when a victim of crime needs help to recover.

Our bank provides assistance with in-person interpretation, translations, and telephonic interpretation. Our in-person interpreters are specially-trained on how to work in the victim-services setting and are available at all hours of the day and night—every day of the year on a scheduled or emergency basis.

Current Providers: We value our partnership with you.

We offer you the following free services to ensure that you are able to assist those you help, regardless of the language spoken by them:

Specially-trained, in-person interpreters working in 13 languages. Our interpreters have all completed training on how to work in the victim-services setting. You can request an interpreter in advance or for immediate assistance. Interpreters can be requested at any time of the day or night, every day of the year.

Telephonic interpretation in more than 200 languages, available at any hour of the day or night, every day of the year.

Interested Providers

If you have never used the services of the Victim Services Interpreter Bank before but would like to, you may be able to join our bank. If you meet certain criteria, and if there is funding available, you will receive services for free.

Eligibility

You may apply to receive free services from the Victim Services Interpreter Bank if you are a non-profit organization that provides non-legal victim services to DC residents or to individuals who were victims of crimes committed in DC.

Before completing an application to become part of the Victim Services Interpreter Bank, please contact us to ensure that our funding allows for accepting new applications at this time. You may write to interpreterbank@ayuda.com.

Washington, DC, is the proud home to an active pro bono community among private law firms. Some of the pro bono work involves working with limited-English proficient and Deaf/Hard of Hearing clients.

Many law firms turn to Ayuda’s Community Legal Interpreter Bank to meet their need for interpretation on pro bono matters since our interpreter bank consists of top-notch interpreters, who collectively speak 35 different languages.

We hire only trained interpreters. What does this mean for the firms who use them? It means these firms enjoy the assurance of knowing that our interpreters have all:

Completed at least 40 hours of foundation training in interpretation.

Received specialized training in working with lawyers (including training in the attorney/client privilege, the unauthorized practice of law, and confidentiality).

Use of the Community Legal Interpreter Bank is free for certain nonprofits because of the public funding that supports the project. Other nonprofits may not be eligible for subsidized use of the bank, but may still wish to use it for a fee. (Ayuda will charge a nominal administrative fee above the cost of paying the interpreters.)

Such non-profits include:

A nonprofit offering legal services to clients who live in Virginia and who have legal matters only in Virginia.

A nonprofit offering legal services to clients who live in Maryland (outside of Montgomery County) and who have legal matters only in Maryland (outside of Montgomery County).

If you are a nonprofit that would like to access the services of the bank for a fee, please contact us at interpreterbank@ayuda.com.

Thank you for being an interpreter with one of our interpreter banks. Because of you, the Washington metropolitan area is a safer and more welcoming place to live, no matter the language.

Your work helps people access the food stamps that they are entitled to, get repairs made in their apartments, receive counseling to heal and recover after a violent attack, and do many other things. All of us at Ayuda appreciate the role that you play in improving language access. We value our partnership with you.

If you ever have questions or concerns about your work with Ayuda, please contact us atinterpreterbank@ayuda.com. If your concerns are not adequately addressed, please contact Ayuda’s Language Access Director, David Steib, at david@ayuda.com.

Below we have included relevant forms and manuals for your convenience.

Community Legal Interpreter Bank

Thank you for the work that you do to allow communication between pro bono/public interest lawyers and their low-income clients. We appreciate your willingness to accept assignments in both Washington, DC, and Montgomery County, Maryland.

Point of Contact Signature
Form

Interpreter W-9
Form

Interpreter Confidentiality
Agreement

If you are an interpreter who is passionate about helping people, we invite you to work with us at Ayuda. You will receive paid assignments to help people in need of legal assistance or to help victims of crime who are in need of recovery services. We offer opportunities in two language access interpreter banks.

Community Legal Interpreter Bank

As an interpreter for our Community Legal Interpreter Bank, you will work with lawyers and their low-income clients during one-on-one meetings outside of court. In order to work for the bank, you must:

Have already completed 40 hours of training in interpretation. If you have not, visit this page to learn more about getting foundation training.

Complete training on how to work with lawyers in and out of court settings. Some examples include The Language of Justice, Specialist Certificate: Legal or Foundations of Legal Interpreting for American Sign Language and Certified Deaf interpreters, etc.

Demonstrate proficiency in English and in your working languages as an interpreter.

To learn more about the policies and procedures regarding working for the Community Legal Interpreter Bank, please visit our webpage for interpreters currently working for the Bank.

If you would like to apply to work for the Community Legal Interpreter Bank, please email interpreterbank@ayuda.com so that we may conduct a preliminary screening to determine whether your training and experience qualify you to apply to work for the Bank. Please attach to the email a copy of your resume and any proof of credentials. In the body of the email, please include your contact information, working language(s), and the name of Bank for which you are interested in working.

Victim Services Interpreter Bank

As an interpreter for our Victim Services Interpreter Bank, you will work with victims of crime and their social workers, therapists, and nurses in the DC Metropolitan area during sessions focused on the recovery of the victim. The majority of assignments occur during regular business hours, but a small number of assignments do occur during nights and weekends (including a limited number of assignments in the middle of the night). Although most assignments are scheduled in advance, the Bank is designed to offer assistance on an emergency basis as well. Interpreters who accept emergency assignments or assignments during off hours can negotiate to receive compensation at a higher rate.

As an interpreter for our Victim Services Interpreter Bank, you must:

Have already completed 40 hours of training in interpretation. If you have not, visit this page to learn more about getting foundation training.

Have taken victim or trauma-centered training to be able to work with victims of crime.

Demonstrate proficiency in English and in your working languages as an interpreter.

If you would like to apply to work for the Victim Services Interpreter Bank, please email interpreterbank@ayuda.com so that we may conduct a preliminary screening to determine whether your training and experience qualify you to apply to work for the Bank. Please attach to the email a copy of your resume and any proof of credentials. In the body of the email, please include your contact information, working language(s), and the name of Bank for which you are interested in working.

Ayuda Training

Do you care deeply about seeing crime victims overcome trauma by connecting them to vital services? Would you like to gain the skills necessary to work directly with crime victims? If so, then we have fantastic news to share! Ayuda’s Language Access Program will be holding another session of our Breaking Silence: Interpreting for Victim Services interpreter training this May!

Breaking Silence will take place in Silver Spring, MD from Friday, May 17th, 2019 through Monday, May 20th, 2019 (from 9AM to 5PM on all 4 days). The training is free, but applicants who are selected to attend the training will be asked to submit a refundable $50 deposit online in order to hold their place in the class.

This year’s training is being funded by the Maryland Governor’s Office of Crime Control and Prevention (GOCCP MD) under sub-award number VOCA-2018-0100, which was funded by Award No. 2018-V2-GX-0032 awarded by the Office for Victims of Crime, Office of Justice Programs, Department of Justice. Many graduates of the training have eventually successfully applied to accept paid assignments as independent contractors from Ayuda’s Victim Services Interpreter Bank, also sponsored by GOCCP MD. If you would like to learn more about the training before applying, please review our Frequently Asked Questions for Applicants to the “Breaking Silence: Interpreting for Victim Services” Interpreter Training.

Language Access staff will notify applicants about the status of their application in April.

Ideal candidates for this training:

If you are interested in applying for Breaking Silence, and if you’re an interpreter who has already taken a 40-hour foundational interpretation training, then we would love to receive an application from you!

We also offer “The Language of Justice: Interpreting for Legal Services” interpreter training, but we are not currently accepting applications for that training.

Below you will find a few of our training resources as well as a recorded webinar about how to use Salesforce. If you are interested in learning more about language access as a form of overall justice along with tips to create more language-just spaces, feel free to check out this resource by Antena.

If you are interested in gaining more experience and training on interpretation, visit this page.

We will be adding more resources very soon – check back in a few weeks for more!

Our Interpreter Trainings

Breaking Silence is a four-day to five-day training program for interpreters that was created for the Emergency and Victim Services Bank. The manual helps prepare professional interpreters for victim services interpreting.

For their safety, security and well-being, all Ayuda staff, interns and volunteers will be teleworking until further notice. We will continue to support our clients during this difficult time, but we need your help.

Your gift today will help fund our critical work to provide quality legal services, comprehensive social services and language access services to low-income immigrants in D.C., Virginia and Maryland.

In a time of social distancing and isolation, it is more important than ever that we come together and let the most vulnerable in our community know they are not alone.